Anatomical Wallpaper Paintings

Migrating to New York in 1942, Florence found herself again working as a seamstress. Alone in her tenement apartment, she would sew during the day, but at night she would tear out the pages of Gray’s anatomy books she bought around the corner. Pasting the pages together into large sheets, she augmented the anatomical illustrations and medical texts with a gore like paint treatment - as if to bring the theoretical and educational quality of the texts to life and into the real world of her experience - like the wounded flesh of the male bodies that she had cared for as a nurse during WWI. She pinned the 44 sheets to the wall like wallpaper.

Perhaps she came to New York hoping to connect with the diaspora from her homeland and energize her for political engagement. But it didn’t work out that way...